posted 05-15-2011 07:55 PM
On May 5, 1961 Astronaut Alan B. Shepard flew in a Project Mercury capsule on a suborbital mission in response to the challenge thrown three weeks earlier by the Soviet Union on April 12 - when cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin went around the world in 108 minutes to become the first spaceman.

Their missions changed the world 50 years ago this year...

Jim Busby, aerospace historian and technical adviser to such motion pictures as "Race Into Space" and "From the Earth to the Moon" takes us back to Camelot and the times of Kennedy, Gagarin and Shepard at the next Aerospace Legacy Foundation general meeting. It will be held in the briefing lounge upstairs at Columbia Memorial Space Center in Downey, CA at 12400 Columbia Way at 1:30 PM Saturday May 21, 2011. and is FREE to the public on a first come, first served basis. Refreshments will be served.

He will answer the questions:

What world events led up to those flights?

Did the Russians lose any people before Gagarin?

What were the failures?

Was Gagarin's flight really a success?

Why select these two guys? And what happened to them afterwards?

What led to the decision to go to the Moon by 1970 by President Kennedy?